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Talk:2015 SCTEA Synopsis for Tri-County Technical College's Social Sciences Department Wiki
Rachel's thoughts: This was my first time at the SCTEA conference, so I was eager to attend as many sessions as possible. I hope that you will find the synopses and PDFs of the presentations I attended (on the main page of this wiki) helpful! You will notice that there are "helpful links" listed at the bottom of the main page. For a list of all presentations, click here . If anything not covered on this wiki piques your interest, you can visit the SCTEA page for PDFs of most presentations shown in the program. My department head (hi, Kate!) asked that I attend the conference with the goal of returning with a "golden nugget" of information. Indeed, it is hard to home in on one particular presentation as many of the sessions I attended meet this criterion. Here I will briefly discuss the main take-aways from some of the most enlightening sessions: Background to Behaviors: Using Skills & Behaviors to Understand College Readiness This particular presentation was given by ETS and the ultimate goal was to drum up interest in their new evaluation program, aimed at advising and retention. They did provide good information, however, in discussing "non-cognitive" skills that are associated with retention and success. To put it simply, this presentation discussed how background (measured by socioeconomic status and test scores) is a good predictor of aptitude but not as good a predictor for college success and retention. Rather, it is non-cognitive skills (motivation, test taking strategies, goal setting, institutional committment, team working ability, study skills, metacognition, conscientiousness, social support, and self efficacy) that are better predictive of long-term success and "sticking it out" in college. What this tells us is that a large part of what keeps students in college and helps them fulfill their educational goals are coachable ''and ''maleable ''skills. The take-away here is that instructors should provide resources, referral, and help in improving their students' non-cognitive skills. 'Imbedded Test of Critical Thinking' If I had to pick a favorite presentation, this would be it. Brandon Loudermilk is a statistician by trade, but teaches psychology as well. He has implemented a wagering system in his classrooms, so that students can "gamble" on their responses to test items. The approach is simple: Loudermilk gave 35-item tests to his students and allowed them to wager between 0-2 points per item, based on how confident they are that they chose the correct answer. Students, of course, have the option to "play it safe" and test normally by giving each response a point value of 1. The vast majority of students, however, chose to wager and, in doing so, tended to do about 4 pts better than their "play it safe" counterparts. The reason? Students know what they ''know. And the know what they don't know. The outcome of 4 pts higher is not so much the benefit of this approach, rather, it is Loudermilk's observation that wagering increased students' feelings of confidence in testing and, through the process of wagering, students were able to "review" where their knowledge is solid and where it is tenuous. As Loudermilk uses cumulative tests, this was helpful for his students in that they were able to better tailor their study methods, and he was better able to tailor his lectures and assignments to focus on the information that students were struggling to grasp. It is this "reflective practice," as Loudermilk called it, that is so valuable to the student and instructor alike. Further, he stated that he believed students felt more confident in testing because they felt like they had more control over their outcomes. He argued that, while standard testing procedures measure content ''and ''ability, incorporating wagering also allows instructors to measure the students' ability to critically think. While I did find this presentation particularly interesting, the presenter and audience concurred that this would be hard to implement in online courses, distance education courses, or courses with a very large class size. Study Smarter not Harder This presentation focused on study skills and techniques that will be familiar to any instructor who has taught a "College 101" course. However, this information is invaluable and something that, I would argue, all instructors should impart to their students. Few wouldn't argue that study skills and approaches to learning should be largely informed by research and knowledge of learning, memory, and cognition. What I found of considerable value is a group exercise that the presenter implemented during this session. First, she allowed us to work individually and gave us a series of written instructions of how to draw a picture. As you can see in her presentation, the directions were somewhat difficult, and you can guess that when she asked us to rate our confidence of being correct, most of us rated our work pretty low. Next, she allowed us to work in groups of three, and gave us a new series of written instructions of how to draw a picture. While these instructions were just as difficult, working within a group allowed us to combine our thoughts, determine the best course of action, and reach consensus on confusing aspects of the assignment. As you can guess, our confidence following the group assignment was rated much higher. Indeed, when she revealed the answers, our pictures drawn as a group were much closer to the "answer" than the drawings we made individually. If anything, this exercise is valuable in that it makes a very effective point as to the benefit of working with a group, both in the classroom, and out (in the form of study groups). One of the biggest challenges that we often have in the classroom is getting students interested in group work or forming study teams. This exercise will help show them that, despite how much they might initially hate ''working or studying in a group, it ''is darned effective. Rlaustin86 (talk) 16:46, February 26, 2015 (UTC) (These are the personal thoughts of one attendee. This wiki is community-based and alterable by anyone! Feel free to contribute by clicking the '''TALK '''button at the top of this page!)